Tip O'Neill famously said all politics is local. Yesterday, Republicans won big by turning that adage on its head. They nationalized state races and turned President Obama's unpopularity and his administration's failures into anvils around the necks of Democratic candidates. Even states that Obama carried turned against him. A happy exception to that trend was …
Continue reading Election 2014 – is consensus as remote as ever?
Dear Angela, Reams have been written and will continue to be written about your beloved husband, Tom; hours have been spent broadcasting his myriad accomplishments as Boston's longest running mayor. History will reflect on the many things he did to leave his imprint on the city and, indeed, the region. Future generations will marvel at the …
New York City likes to see itself as informed and sophisticated, but the city's response to its first case of ebola was anything but. The headlines screamed "Ebola in NYC." News stories on television and on the electrified sides of skyscrapers flashed danger. Photos of the doctor diagnosed, who had ridden the subway, eaten at a …
Tonight's televised benign if mildly tense debate between Charlie Baker and Martha Coakley was clearly a draw, which may have been the defensive objective of all concerned. Comfortably moderated by WGBH talk show hosts Jim Braude and Margery Eagan, both candidates stuck to their well honed, but by now shop-worn messages, spoke calmly, and smiled wanly …
Forget the Pilgrim, the Minuteman and the Indian (Squanto?). The real symbol of Massachusetts is the pothole. The state has done a dreadful job of keeping up our infrastructure. There are particularly bad places where hubcaps pile up by the side of the road. Fixing our roads and bridges is paid for by gas tax …
Today Boston Herald Editorial Page Editor Shelley Cohen has a heartfelt and candid apology for the racist cartoon it published showing President Obama in his bathroom squeezing toothpaste onto his toothbrush while a White House intruder looks on from the bathtub. The uninvited visitor asks, "Have you tried the watermelon-flavored toothpaste?" The intent of the cartoon two and …
Continue reading Shelley Cohen, the Boston Herald and racist cartoon
Two trumpets, a horn, a euphonium and a tuba, a brass quintet performing the music for Saturday’s memorial for the late Boston Globe food writer and editor Gail Perrin. The music was loud, bold, brassy and confident: how very Gail Perrin. Gail was remembered for her warmth, her whimsy, her hospitality, her lust for international …
Continue reading Globe food editor Gail Perrin and her link to Peter Frates
WBZ performed its civic duty by including three independent candidates for governor in Tuesday's gubernatorial debate, but the three added little to the process. It's one thing to give everyone equal access in the early stages of the campaign, helping the independents get themselves known, make their views known, raise some money and perhaps gain some …
Continue reading Gubernatorial debate: too crowded for clarity
Apparently, the number of Massachusetts voters willing to accept casinos has grown from 37 percent to 53 percent, that according to a Boston Herald poll. I had even begun to think that, well, if Springfield needs jobs and wants casinos, why repeal its opportunity to have them? Same thing with the slots parlor in Plainville. …
Will it take a Baltimore Orioles/Washington Nationals World Series to bring members of Congress back to Washington soon? If so, it only highlights Congress' cowardly unwillingness to exercise its Constitutional responsibility and vote on the ISIS war. This least productive, shortest session of Congress ended with no debate on President Obama's new response to the terrorist threat roiling …
Marjorie Arons-Barron 